Pixi Plus

Back in March, we told you about the PDK Hot Apps competition that Palm was holding, hoping to get some of the best mobile applications shown off for their webOS-based devices. In the process, application developers had the opportunity to win upwards of $100,000 in prize money. And, finally, while the competition ended a couple of weeks ago, Palm has finally unveiled who the winners were, and in which category.

UK carrier O2 and Palm have announced that the Pre Plus and Pixi Plus will be arriving on the network come May 28th. The handsets - which will be the same as their US brethren, only supporting O2's UMTS/HSPA network - will be priced from free, tariff depending. Full details after the cut.

Palm's App Catalog appears to have suffered a meltdown of sorts, with users of Palm Pre, Pixi, Pre Plus and Pixi Plus handsets reporting that after having downloaded a new title - whether paid or free - no aftermarket software will run properly. The issue remains even after fully erasing and restarting the phone; in fact, the apps are still installed even after that process is completed. However core functionality - calls, messaging and data - are all unaffected.

Facebook is good for something, we imagine. After all, more and more companies are utilizing the social networking site to announce things. Huge things, in fact. For example, today marks the official announcement of the Palm Pre Plus for AT&T and when, for how much, and a little bit of extra goodness thrown in for good measure courtesy of AT&T's Facebook page.

Find yourself talking to Palm CEO Jon Rubinstein, and the furore of speculation, leaks and general rumors are bound to come up. "They've been incessant since I joined the company" Rubinstein told SlashGear today, as we talked to the chief executive about the possibilities of takeovers, webOS devices of tomorrow and how Palm has learnt from the poorly handled Verizon launch. Media-savvy, confident about his company's future and bracingly honest about Palm's shortcomings, the picture Rubinstein paints is one of a plucky little firm with an exciting product roadmap to come.

Having been spotted last month tiptoeing through the GCF in GSM form, the Palm Pre Plus and Pixi Plus have been confirmed for launch on O2 Germany. Announced with a tweet from the carrier's account, the two webOS smartphones will apparently go up for sale on April 28th. While there's no word from O2's other European arms, the assumption is that the two handsets will see similar launches in Spain, Ireland and the UK.

Late last night, news broke across everyone's desk that Palm was putting itself up for sale. That's tough information for a lot of people to swallow, but the painting is right on the wall. With a substantial loss reported earlier this year, and the simple fact that the Verizon Wireless bred Palm Pre Plus and Pixi Plus didn't sell nearly as well as Palm would have liked doesn't make it any easier. And, while talk of a sale is hard for Palm fans to hear, many consider it the right thing for the company to do. But, what may be better, are the two other options that Palm has up their sleeve.

There's a lot of Palm fans out there. Even more so, there's a lot of webOS fans out there. And yes, there's even a few Palm Pre and Pixi device fans out there. There's no way of getting around that, ladies and gentlemen. Just like there's iPhone and Android fans. They exist, and their voices are pretty loud. But that's not going to stop the truth from barreling forward. And, the truth is, sadly, that Palm isn't doing too hot. So, obviously, there's all sorts of talk about Palm being bought, acquired, or otherwise gobbled up by some other company. Today's no different.

Palm's attempt to turn webOS devices into financial security continues apace, with Verizon slashing prices of the Palm Pre Plus and Pixi Plus to $49.99 and $29.99 respectively. In addition, Verizon have also slashed away the subscription fee for Mobile Hotspot functionality, which turns the Pre Plus or the Pixi Plus into a MiFi-style 3G sharing hotspot for up to five WiFi clients.

Palm look to be continuing to make good on their promise to turn around company fortunes by leveraging their existing handset line-up, and the next stage in that is a European release of the Palm Pre Plus and Pixi Plus. Spotted crossing the GCF (Global Certification Forum)'s testing as the Palm P101UEU and P121UEU, the two devices are quadband GSM and dualband 900/2100MHz HSDPA.

As expected, Palm isn't doing that hot. The company declared at the end of last month that their lacking smartphones sales had made them decrease their revenue expectations, so the numbers we're hearing today aren't that surprising. And while the number of smartphones they shipped is significant, it's unfortunately not a good representation of the number of smartphones they actually sold. Still, the company has high hopes for what's to come.

The launch of a Palm smartphone running webOS on AT&T's network hasn't actually been confirmed as of yet, but that's not stopping the analysts from declaring their assumptions. The release of the AT&T Palm Pre (Plus?) and Pixi (Plus?) has been on the rumor mill for quite some time, and many people think it's just about as confirmed as it can get without an actual official statement from Palm. It would be a great thing to see a webOS device hit AT&T, but not so much if these latest murmurings have any truth to them.